


Narcissa

by Drel_Murn



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Character Study, F/M, Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-30
Updated: 2020-04-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:07:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23922082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drel_Murn/pseuds/Drel_Murn
Summary: Narcissa. Sweet little Marcy, youngest of three, little Narcissa Black who is not really a Black at all.
Relationships: Lucius Malfoy/Narcissa Black Malfoy
Kudos: 17





	Narcissa

Narcissa. Sweet little Marcy, youngest of three, little Narcissa Black who is not really a Black at all. Sweet little Marcy, youngest daughter of Druella Black of Druella Rosier who is not really Cygnus Black’s daughter, whose father is unknown, not in the sense that he is not talked about but in the sense that everyone knew that Druella had not been in so much as the same building for at least three years when Narcissa Black was born. Little Marcy Black whose father is unknown, not in the sense that everyone knows Druella had a gentleman caller but in the sense that everyone knows that she did not, in the sense that everyone knows that Pollux and Irma Black had cursed their daughter in law such that she would feel pain in the presence of anyone other than her husband in an attempt to procure more grandchildren.

Sweet little Narcissa, whose name might pass at a glance if you are not as familiar with constellations as the Black family is.

Sweet little Marcy who does not meet either of her sisters until she is sent to school. Sweet little Marcy who only meet her father when her mother dies during her first school year. Sweet little Marcy who does not so much fall in love with Lucius Malfoy as fall in desperation with him, into protection from a family that sees her very existence as an affront, from a family that would as gladly kill her as they would kill the mudbloods they both hate.

Sweet little Marcy who only loves her husband after she is safe, who loves him for his awkwardness, who loves him for the way he is so excited to share everything with her, for the way they can sit, heads tilted together and talk, for the way that he stands by her side against the world as her name is dragged into the mud with her sisters - the mudblood lover and the lunatic.

(She admits to him, at night, when they’re curled together under the blankets like the children just out of school that they are right now, though Lucius has found a job at the ministry even though he’d rather be a Healer, and Narcissa has finally figured out how to host a garden party from Lucius’s mother, that she’s scared of learning about who her father is.

_ I wonder _ , she says,  _ if he might be a muggle. If I am no better than the people I have been taught to hate. _

And Lucius says,  _ If you are then we’ll leave. We’ll go somewhere else and change our names and be other people. We’ll forget about this war. _

Lucius already had the darkmark. Narcissa remember the day he got it, remembers the way he’d stumbled into the common room, pale and sweating, clutching at his arm like a handful of other Slytherins as a group of older years guided them into the common room, laughing.

He’d told her,  _ If I didn’t take it, he would have killed me. I couldn’t die. I had to be here for you. _ )

It is Narcissa who names her son Draco. The healer say that he will be the only child she will ever have. With Lucius there, Narcissa looks down at him, and breathing in the smell of the soap that St. Mungos used on all of its blankets, leaning into Lucius, she calls him Draco,  _ my little dragon, my little star _ .

And he is not exactly a fuck you to the Black family, though in Many ways he is, but all Narcissa can think when she sees him is how small he is. And when Lucius holds him after they’ve returned home, his sleeve is rolled up enough that she can see the stark black of the darkmark against his skin, and Narcissa has to go and have a little cry, because this is the world she has brought her son into.

Their problems don’t end when the Dark Lord dies, the only change.

And Draco grows.

And Draco grows.

And Draco grows.

And Draco is going off to school. And Draco is meeting the boy who defeated the Dark Lord, and Draco is complaining about him in every letter, and Narcissa’s heart is in her mouth. 

Narcissa wants to tell Draco to stop antagonising Potter, because she remembers James Potter, five years younger and still a better fighter cornering her and looking at her with something that made her want to tremble with fear, remembers that though he never acts on that, that James Potter did plenty else.

Narcissa wants to tell Draco to keep antagonizing Potter if that’s what it takes to keep him away from his housemates because her son is in Slytherin, and some days all she can remember is Lucius stumbling into the common room looking like he was dying as older students’ laughter rings in her ears.

Ten years after the Dark Lord’s death, Lucius deems it safe enough to start to get rid of the cursed objects that the Dark Lord had . . .  _ entrusted _ them with. And much as he hates him, Arthur Weasley is the best in the field at working with cursed objects. More so than Alastor Moody, more so than any of the so called Dark families, more so than Dumbledor, for all of his fame, and Lucius has heard him lecturing his children enough that he thinks he can trust them to give anything cursed to their father.

It goes wrong. It all goes wrong. People are getting petrified once again, and Narcissa is terrified for her son, for her little dragon. She argues with Lucius when he refuses to pull Draco out of school. He is pale and he’s shaking nearly as much as he had been when he came back to the common room with the darkmark, but he stands firm in his refusal to bring Draco home.

Narcissa can’t sleep. She can barely eat. Draco doesn’t even come home for Christmas.

It gets bad enough that, with Lucius’s begging, she takes the Draught of the Living Dead. It’s not . . . it’s not a good solution. It’s a very risky one, but the Healer they brought in nd swore to secrecy said that if she didn’t start taking care of herself, she wouldn’ last much longer.

She wakes slowly, to Lucius clutching her hand. He isn’t looking that well either, but then he’d always done better when he had someone to fuss about, and a coma patient isn’t very conducive to fussing. He manages to tell her that Draco is safe, that Potter had killed - had killed  _ something _ after the youngest Weasley went missing, and that Draco is safe, before he breaks out crying. It takes a lot of effort for Narcissa to move between the coma and her fasting prior, but she slowly and surely manages to gather him up and hold him close.

They do not try to get rid of the cursed items again.

And third year there was a man who was  _ probably _ not a mass murderer on the loose, but Narcissa doesn’t hold her breath. Narcissa doesn’t know what her cousin is now, but she remembers his temper. Narcissa Malfoy who was never a Black remembers that he was just as bad as James Potter, except maybe that he never cornered her that he didn’t taunt her for her name even though even Andromeda who learned to love muggles had.

(Narcissa Malfoy who was never a Black remembers that he was just as bad as James Potter, except  _ maybe _ that he never cornered her that he didn’t taunt her for her name even though even Andromeda who learned to love muggles had.

Narcissa Malfoy who was never a Black remembers - not how Sirius who always was and always will be a Black stormed out of the Black Townhouse. She was not there. She doesn’t know the rhythm of his words, the tenor of his arguments. Narcissa doesn’t know how James Potter’s parents welcomed him, doesn’t know if he would have come to marry James Potter if James Potter had not married Lily Evans first, does not know if her cousin not a cousin would have come to marry them both because married or not Narcissa Malfoy remembers the Sirius Black leaned on James Potter’s shoulder in his brand new Hit Wizard robes at their graduation, Narcissa Malfoy remembers the way Lily Potter walked boldly into the Malfoy ball not on the arm of her husband but on the arm of his best fried.

If it wouldn’t be unbelievable coming from someone everyone  _ knew _ was a Death Eater, Narcissa would have pushed her husband to defend him, when he was arrested and not.

Narcissa Malfoy wonders - if Lucius had not gone out that one Hogsmead weekend, if Lucius had not been cornered and compelled by the older students, if, if if he had avoided getting caught in this trap of Dark and Light and prejudices that neither he nor Narcissa truly believe in,  _ if _ -

Narcissa Malfoy wonders if she could have been the one he ran to. She would have done a lot more to help others escape the blackhole gravity of the Black family.)

But Sirius Black was almost as bad as James Potter, and Narcissa remembers how much he hated his family and hopes desperately he doesn’t hate her son.

Sirius Black does not hate her son, or at least he does not hate him enough to go out of his way.

The dementors are called off after a year and she breathes a sigh of relief.

Fourth year is blissfully safe, right up until the end, when Lucius doubles over during dinner, clutching his arm in a familiar manner, and Narcissa feels fear settling in her gut like a stone. Their eyes meet, then Lucius is standing and moving.

“Go to the tournament,” he tells her because if the Dark Lord is back, it can only be because of Potter.

Draco . . . Draco does not perhaps know exactly why Narcissa is there. Draco has never seen his mother at Hogwarts before.

Narcissa does not like to think about Hogwarts. To her, Hogwarts is full of corners she was cornered in, common rooms for people she has little in common with. Hogwarts is meeting your sisters for the first time and being told you are unworthy, unknown.

Narcissa is at Hogwarts, and when Draco sees her there, he goes bright for one moment, and he goes scared the next because Narcissa does not go to Hogwarts for all that she insisted he should.

They’ve only just hugged when Potter arrives, bringing a dead body that makes Narcissa clutch her child closer. She does not bring him home with her.

The Dark Lord is there when she gets home, and he croons, “Narcissa, lovely to see you once again. So sad to hear about your sister,” like he doesn’t know that Bellatrix hates Narcissa, like he hasn’t forced them into the same room for his own entertainment before.

Fifth year is a nightmare of its own for the man living in her guest bedrooms, using her towels and her bedsheets and her dishes and her silverware and eating her food. But st least Draco is safe. Draco is safe. Draco is safe.

He writes to her, uncertain of what to do under Umbridge, but he is safe.

Draco is safe until he comes home for the summer, and the Dark Lord takes an interest in him.

There are no older student dragging a group off to get marked. Draco gets his darkmark in Narcissa’s solar, the Dark Lord sitting on her favorite rocking chair under one of her favorite blankets.

Narcissa looks at her house and knows that should the war ever end, she won’t be able to live here.

Narcissa does what she has to do.

Draco’s sixth year is a nightmare.

Draco’s seventh year . . .

Potter is breathing when Narcissa checks. Potter is so young.

“Is he alive?” the Dark Lord demands, but she’s never cared about him anyways.

Draco is alive. Draco is alive alive alive-

Lucius helps hunt down the other Death Eaters after the war. It was always Nacrissa and Lucius against the world. Still, Narcissa wonders how many of them were like Lucius. She wonders how many of them were like Draco.

And they do move after the war. Well, move is a strong word for what they do.

Narcissa and Lucius go to the house Lucius’s parent lived in for the last years of their life with only the clothes on their back, and they burn those when they get there. There are clothes enough, even if they are old fashioned.

They get a grandchild.

Andromeda shows up one day without explanation.

Narcissa did not grow up with her, but she’d watched the way Andy took her tea for months before she approached her, and she watched for years after she’d been rejected. Andy is surprised. They sit in silence.

After the first time Andy brings her grandson over, and they watch him play as they talk.

“I know who your father was,” Andy says when Teddy is five. “Father didn’t stop us from seeing Mother until you were around three.”

“Was he a pureblood? A halfblood?” Narcissa asks. Or perhaps it is not Narcissa. Perhaps it is Marcy, sweet Marcy, who is still unsure of her place in the world for all that she is content with what she has made of her life.

“. . . no.”

“ _ Good. _ ”

(Narcissa tell Lucius this that night. They’re curled together under the covers again, and in the darkness, breathing together Narcissa can almost believe that they’re young again.

“Do you want to leave?” Lucius asks, tipping his head so their foreheads are touching, and holding her hands. “I promised you we could.”

Narcissa thinks of Draco and his wife and his son. She thinks of Andy and Teddy. It’s not much, but . . .

“No. I think I want to stay.”

“Alright. Then we’ll stay.”)

**Author's Note:**

> . . . I don't know.
> 
> Find my tumblr at [drelmurn.tumblr.com](drelmurn.tumblr.com)
> 
> I am also writing [Sparks At My Fingertips](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9230822) in the Harry Potter fandom (though it's kind of low in my priority queue).


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